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This is a discussion on Mac Games Here: within the Mac Games forums, part of the Mac Software category; Games Workshop announced today a Space Hulk game for Mac, iOS, and (yes) PC. It’s scheduled for release in 2013, and is based on the ...

Space Hulk Looms Ever Nearer To Your Mac, iPhone, Or iPad

Games Workshop announced today a Space Hulk game for Mac, iOS, and (yes) PC. It’s scheduled for release in 2013, and is based on the Warhammer 40,000 franchise board game of the same name. The current digital version is planned to be a 3D turn-based strategy game with both single player and co-op modes of play, not to mention cross-platform multiplayer across iOS, Mac, and PC.

The original board game was first released in 1989 and was subsequently re-released in 2009. A Space Hulk, for the curious, is a massive derelict hunk of space debris, like starships, asteroids, and the like. This stuff accretes together, making a small moon-sized astronomical object which can contain scary aliens or enticing treasures. Oh, and it might slip away through a dimensional time warp at any moment, so teams of Space Marines need to get in–and get out–super quick. Essentially, this is a sci-fi storytelling machine.

In the current digital iteration of Space Hulk, you’ll get to be one of those squads of Space Marines going into a Space Hulk to fight off the alien Genestealers (they are what their name implies) throughout the corridors the mass of debris. Which, you know, sounds like TONS of fun, especially if it’s not real.

Features of this fine addition to the Warhammer 40K universe include:

Blood Angel terminator squad
Fearsome Genestealers with challenging AI
Thematic 3d environment
Single player campaign based on the “Sin of Damnation” hulk
New co-op multiplayer levels against the Genestealer AI
Multiplayer head-to-head recreating the board game experience against a friend
Cross platform multiplayer between PC, Mac and iOS
Level editor with ability to share creations
Game expansions in the future as DLC

Batman: Arkham City finally hitting Mac this month

Originally slated to arrive last month, it looks like the Mac version of Batman: Arkham City is on track for release by the end of December. In development at Feral Interactive, the game was released on consoles and Windows in fall 2011 and recently came to Nintendo's new Wii U.

Feral was responsible for porting the original Batman: Arkham Asylum to Mac last November. It has handled other high-profile conversions such as BioShock, BioShock 2 and Deus Ex: Human Revolution.

The Mac version of Batman: Arkham City will sell for US$40 and features all of the DLC released for other versions of the game. This means the additional Harley Quinn's Revenge side story, plus the Catwoman, Nightwing and Robin packs are included.

In other Mac game news, Aspyr Media has launched Rollercoaster Tycoon 3: Platinum on the Mac App Store, Steam and its own digital storefront, GameAgent. You can get it or any other title for 25 percent off on GameAgent using the discount code GameAgent25.

The critically acclaimed RPG The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings is now available on the Mac App Store. The development team promises that your choices really do matter, and will determine the fate of the people and kingdoms in the game. You’ll fight blood-thirsty monsters as protagonist Geralt of Rivia, as well as navigate politics, lies, and gorgeous environments.

The full Enhanced Edition includes all the extras in an uncut version for $19.99, for a limited time on the App Store. It was previously available on Good Old Games and Steam.

Only the latest Macs are able to handle this game, so the developers at CD Projekt RED have prepared a way for you to make sure your Mac can run it, graphically. Head over to the Witcher 2 web page and check your Mac’s compatibility, either by downloading an app that will check automatically or by clicking through some web buttons to specify which specific Mac you own. My mid-2011 Macbook Air isn’t able to run this new edition, unfortunately, but yours may, so be sure to check it out.

You are Geralt of Rivia, a witcher, a member of a mysterious caste of professional beast-slayers created through brutal training and mutation. Witchers specialize in tracking down and killing monsters. Long gone are the days when beasts lived near human settlements in every forest and cave, and the folk of the Northern Kingdoms held witchers in high regard. The age of elf and dwarf massacres has come, a time when men rival monsters in the evil they do, a time when mutated witchers are regarded as dangerous outcasts, neither human nor nonhuman. Amidst this chaos, Geralt is drawn into a bloody conspiracy. Accused of killing a king, the witcher embarks on a solitary quest to clear his name and uncover the mysteries of his past.

Omerta: City Of Gangsters Hits The Mac In Early 2013, Trailer Released

There’s a new game in town, coming to the Mac early this year, according to Haemimont Games, developer of Tropico. Omerta: City of Gangsters has you work your way up the criminal scene of 1920’s Atlantic City. Start running small jobs, recruit new gang members, and take down other mobsters, grabbing their territory as you take them out. Eventually, you’ll set up your own city-wide crime syndicate and rule Atlantic City’s seedy underground.

Omerta is a rule or code that prohibits divulging the information about the activities of a criminal organization. The game of the same name will feature an historically acurate Atlantic City with 20 unique districts, each with its own real-world landmarks. You’ll be able to play a story-based campaign or an open-world sandbox free play mode.

You’ll get to plan coups, expand your territory, exhort the competition and bribe the authorities, all while planning out tactical combat with other criminals, pull off bank heists, robberies, and street heists. There will be 15 unique characters to control, each with their own personality, background and skills to take in account. There will also be some RPG-like skill trees to help your character become even better at crime! Of course, no game would be complete without competitive and cooperative online multiplayer, and Omerta: City Of Gangsters promises the same, with persistent gangs populating the online play systems.

Sounds like a fairly cool game, and the video above has piqued my interest in this cross between a city-building sim and a strategy game. We’ll be sure to let you know when we hear more about it, of course!

Omerta: City of Gangsters arrives January 31 in Europe and February 12 in North America on PC and Xbox 360, as well. Here’s hoping that the Mac version won’t be far behind.

Valve releases the original Half-Life for Mac

Fifteen years after its release in 1998, Valve Software's groundbreaking first-person shooter Half-Life has made its Mac debut. While its sequel, Half-Life 2, and other games based on Valve's later Source engine have been available on the platform for years, the original Half-Life has remained beyond the reach of Mac gamers without resorting to Boot Camp or other workarounds.

Half-Life is still listed as being Windows-only on the Steam store, but we've confirmed that the option to download it for Mac does appear when selecting the game from within your Steam library. Being such an old game, it runs very well on lower-end systems.

You can buy Half-Life for US$9.99 from the Steam store, but you might just find that you already own a copy since the game has been included with various Mac-compatible compilations even though it was only made available for the platform today.

Grand Theft Auto V pushed back to September

Rockstar Games has finally slapped a release date on Grand Theft Auto V, but it’s a lot later than expected.

The publisher’s open-world crime opus will launch on September 17, 2013. Rockstar had previously said the game—one of our most anticipated games of the year—would be out this autumn.

“We know this is about four months later than originally planned and we know that this short delay will come as a disappointment to many of you, but, trust us, it will be worth the extra time,” Rockstar wrote in a blog post. “GTAV is a massively ambitious and complex game and it simply needs a little more polish to be of the standard we and, more importantly, you require.”

For now, the game is set to launch on Xbox 360 and Playstation 3. However, Rockstar Vice President of Creativity Dan Houser said everything else is “up for consideration” when asked by IGN last November about the possibility of PC and Wii U versions. There’s also been some speculation that GTAV would come to next-generation consoles from Sony and Microsoft, but of course Rockstar hasn’t said anything on that front.

Grand Theft Auto V returns players to Los Santos—essentially a mock Los Angeles—for the first time since 2004’s Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. The game focuses on three protagonists who work together to carry out their crimes—when they’re not just running amok in the open world setting, that is. Rockstar has said that the world of GTAV is larger than Red Dead Redemption, GTA: San Andreas, and GTAIV combined.

Farming Simulator 2013 Crops Up at The Mac App Store, Now with Multiplayer

I grew up on a farm, and it wasn’t exactly a riot — so I’m surprised anyone would want to simulate farm-life for fun. Then again, we never had a 10-ton Lamborghini tractor. And if we did, I probably wouldn’t have been allowed near it.

Anyway, that’s exactly the sort of thing you can tool around in with Farming Simulator 2013, the latest in a long line of Farming Simulator titles, which just hit the Mac App Store today.

Get yourself into all kinds of wild trouble: harvest crops, take care of farm animals — and then sell everything when you’ve had enough of the mooing and the cow poop. There’s considerable detail in the new version, including lots of big, big tractors, a wide variety of crops such as sugar beet and potatoes, and chicken and sheep to run after, as they plod blindly through all kinds of foul muck in an effort to ruin your day. That last bit’s probably not in the game, it’s just a flashback.

There’s even a multiplayer mode that lets you manage a farm with nine other farmers, online or locally. FS 2013 is $28.

Get Borderlands 2 on Steam Now for Half Price

Borderlands 2 is unequivocally the best first-person shooter available for the Mac. Right now it’s half off at the Steam store, making it $30, meaning you can snag a deal better even than the Mac App Store price of $45.

like its predecessor, Borderlands 2 combines fast-paced combat with role playing concepts like a skill tree, a witty, well-written storyline and a staggering degree of weapon selection. The Steam version also includes multiplayer, something the Mac App Store version doesn’t currently support. Better hurry if you want to catch the deal, though — Borderlands 2 is back at full price tomorrow morning.

LEGO Lord of the Rings brings Middle-earth to Mac on Feb. 21

There's a new Lord of the Rings game on the block and it's coming to Mac later this month. Oh, and it features characters and a world that are literally made out of blocks. Feral Interactive is preparing a port of Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment's LEGO Lord of the Rings, released last fall on other platforms, and will be launching it on the Mac App Store and via its own site on February 21 for US$29.99.

The game adheres to the formula employed by other LEGO titles from developer Traveler's Tales, such as LEGO Batman and Star Wars, and sees the Fellowship of the Ring battling orcs and other baddies from Tolkien's tomes while assembling things out of LEGO bricks to help them on their quest. Two players will be able to collaborate on the adventure which will offer the opportunity to unlock more than 80 playable characters. (Let us just suggest that you keep plastic Frodo and the gang away from the fires of Mt. Doom.)

If this sounds like the sort of adventure you'd like to embark on, you'll need a Mac running OS X 10.7.5 with 4 GB of RAM and 256 MB of video memory to play.

New Borderlands 2 DLC and Cross-Platform Play on Macs Today

Borderlands 2 was one of the best games to hit the Mac -- and plenty of other platforms -- last year. Today, Mac gamers can check out the new DLC, Sir Hammerlock's Big Game Hunt. And even better, a new patch makes it possible to play co-op with PC friends.

Big Game Hunt is the latest expansion to Borderlands 2, adding additional missions and environments after the main campaign. As you might have guessed, the new content focuses on the robot-armed adventurer, Sir Hammerlock. The DLC features an entirely new continent of Pandora, and adds in some high-level loot (and really, that's why we play Borderlands 2, no?).

The team at Aspyr has done a fantastic job keeping Mac gamers in step with the PC release of Borderlands 2, and a Steam update brings the game up to 1.3.1. Biggest advancement? You can now play Borderlands 2 with PC players.

Not only does that mean you can finally link up with some friends for looting on Steam, but it really expands one of the best features of Borderlands 2: co-op. No reason to worry about matchmaking into a game, now. Unfortunately, our note from Aspyr says this will work "for a time," which I assume means until the PC version patches up.

Sir Hammerlock's Big Game Hunt is available now on Steam or Aspyr's GameAgent for $9.99. But members of GameAgent can save 25 percent through a code on the site's front page (you must sign up first, though).